Hey, y'all. Saints fan from Canal Street Chronicles here. Just wanted to say congratulations on the win and I hope you enjoy it thoroughly. Though I couldn't enjoy a single second of it, that was one of the best playoff games I've ever seen. I really thought after Graham's TD that the Saints had the win, but ... well, there's nothing I can think of to say. It hurts.

Good luck in the NFCCG, but first of all, enjoy this win. I'm sure it feels pretty awesome.

Superdome pre-game. Ten minutes from my new apartment. "Holy f***, we really live here."

Team sheet, including pronunciations, should you need help with Isa Abdul-Quddus.

Mrs Jay takes in the view.

Falcons huddle.

Saints huddle.

Offense introductions.

Defense celebrates after Jenkins' TD.

Obligatory.

Obligatory #2 - the refs getting an eyeful.

Gumbo and friends.

I think this was an important play. I can't quite remember.

Drew's record-breaking pass to Sproles.

Brees gets lifted up.

The whole team celebrates.

DREW BREEEEEEES, everyone.

I remember one of these threads for the last two years, but none so far this offseason. Forgive me if I missed it, but CSC there are so many discussions on here that it's hard to keep up.

Here is the place to post all of your predictions for the upcoming season. First of all, I want to see your division winners, wild card teams and playoff predictions. After that, please predict as freely as you like, whether you think Meachem will have a better season than Colston, the 49'ers will bench Alex Smith in Week 5, the Patriots will have more losses than Tom Brady has haircuts, or whatever else.

Consider it automatically Listing yourself, as I'll be back at the end of the season to ridicule everything you have to say. Go ahead, Nostradamus.

Since the last update was mid-season, I’d like to provide a round-up of the CBS Fantasy League we ran here on CSC. I threw in a few awards at the end for those of you that didn’t win a Championship this season (pauses, stares proudly into distance…).

After our last update, after Week 10, there were only 4 weeks left in the fantasy regular season of our 12 team league. The run to the playoffs was exciting and dramatic. Well, as far as fantasy football goes.

In the Poydras Division, Knuckle Heads stormed to the division title and a first round bye with a 10-3-1 record and the most points scored in the league. Led by Tom Brady, LeSean McCoy and Marques Colston, Jeremy Sherwin's team looked unstoppable, despite the late-season loss of Frank Gore. Our glorious leader Dave Cariello went 0-4 to end the season, and his Boom! Wrecked it! ended with a disappointing 5-9 record.

Stujo4 reached the playoffs with a respectable 9-5 record, going unbeaten through the last 4 games thanks to the consistently great scores of Michael Vick, whom Stuart smartly traded for in Week 2. His Girod Division also saw the worst record in the league, from Joseph William Stern's Natural Selections, whose 3-11 record left him on the brink of extinction.

David Kelly's team, Mad Mick Beyond Superdome, pulled ahead of The Bob Loblaw Law Blog after a high scoring Week 11 victory over his divisional rival 127 - 104. This was enough to claim a poor LaSalle Division 8-6. TBLLB (Monkey Poop Battle's team) lost out on a wildcard spot because of their losing head-to-head record with both of the teams that pushed him out of the playoffs.

A terrible end of season slump by natde1016’s Snakes on a Wayne saw his team go 0-4 and drop from first to last place in the Claiborne Division, which was won by a surging Henne Time, Henne Place, who also claimed the remaining bye. Both wildcard spots were taken by teams in this division, with Somewhere Over Dwayne Bowe and Snakes on a Wayne both sneaking in with 7-7 records.

Here are the final regular season standings.

(really don't know how to make that table look normal...)

These teams made the playoffs:

Bye Week: Knuckle Heads 10-3-1 and Henne Time, Henne Place 9-5
Division Winners: Loomis and Lauscha LLP 9-5 and Mad Mick Beyond Superdome 8-6
Wildcard: Somewhere Over Dwayne Bowe 7-7 and Snakes On A Wayne 7-7


WILDCARD ROUND

Loomis and Lauscha LLP (Stujo4) 116 – 112 Snakes On A Wayne (natde1016)

Stujo4, with Michael Vick's amazing 44 points against the Giants, narrowly eliminated Natde1016, whose team's solid scoring was let down only by his selection of Tony Gonzalez (2 points) over Aaron Hernandez, who scored two TD's against the Packers for 16 points.

Mad Mick Beyond Superdome (David Kelly) 73 – 81 Somewhere Over Dwayne Bowe (Andrew Juge)

In a battle of CSC staff members, David Kelly's team of inconsistent stars let him down, with a combined 12 points from the previously on fire Dwayne Bowe and Peyton Hillis. Andrew Juge's team had a poor regular season but made it through to the divisional round led by Jamaal Charles and Peyton Manning.


DIVISIONAL ROUND

Henne Time, Henne Place (Jay Preece) 112  - 66 Loomis and Lauscha LLP (Stujo4)

The Saints held Michael Turner to under 50 rushing yards on MNF, and my suddenly awesome team brushed aside Stujo4. I did get some small help from Aaron Rodgers and his epic 42 point game.

Somewhere Over Dwayne Bowe (Andrew Juge) 96 –  87 Knuckle Heads (Jeremy Sherwin)

The bye week left championship favourite Jeremy Sherwin with too much time to consider his lineup, as he started Buffalo's Steve Johnson (5 points) in favour of Mario Manningham (19 points) and was eliminated by the league's dark horse Somewhere Over Dwayne Bowe, led once again by Jamaal Charles.

CHAMPIONSHIP GAME

Somewhere Over Dwayne Bowe (Andrew Juge) vs Henne Time, Henne Place (Jay Preece)

The Championship game would be my third matchup of the season against Andrew Juge. I had won the previous two, both with 30+ points from Aaron Rodgers, but both had been decided by less than 8 points. This Championship game was an unlikely one, as both of us spent most of the season as underdogs not expected to reach this stage of the playoffs.

Andrew Juge's team was led by the still high-scoring Peyton Manning, with Santana Moss and Hakeem Nicks his usual receiving pair. He had trouble finding help at the RB spot alongside star player Jamaal Charles, and so Tim Hightower, DeAngelo Williams, Joseph Addai and Marion Barber were all used at different times. His tight ends for the season were the pretty average John Carlson and Chris Cooley, and he went through 6 different team defenses, but he still fought hard to end the regular season with a .500 record and make the playoffs.

My own season started disastrously, with a horrible computer mistake filled auto-pick draft. Allow me to gloat about that a little bit. Here are a few excerpts from the live chat on draft night.

(Henne Time, Henne Place autodrafts Packers DST at 19)

8/22/10 7:14 PM    David Kelly (Satch)    Packers in rd 2? Really?
8/22/10 7:14 PM    Paul Schutz (Saintbevo)    WTF?
8/22/10 7:14 PM    jeremy sherwin    WOW!!!!!!
8/22/10 7:14 PM    jeremy sherwin    LMAO
8/22/10 7:14 PM    Dave Cariello    He must have set up a draft order
8/22/10 7:14 PM    shawn kinney    i guess so
8/22/10 7:14 PM    Paul Schutz (Saintbevo)    yeah - a really bad one
8/22/10 7:14 PM    shawn kinney    mustve been planning to be here too lol
8/22/10 7:14 PM    David Kelly (Satch)    I set one up too and now see it's all different than what I set

(Henne Time, Henne Place takes Garrett Hartley in round 5)

8/22/10 7:32 PM    Andrew Juge    Garrett Hartley?!?!?!?!?!
8/22/10 7:32 PM    Paul Schutz (Saintbevo)    well henne time has their kicker taken care of
8/22/10 7:32 PM    shawn kinney    well that really really sucks for him
8/22/10 7:32 PM    shawn kinney    good for us though
8/22/10 7:33 PM    Andrew Juge    dude seriously why Hartley come on
8/22/10 7:33 PM    Andrew Juge    WHY
8/22/10 7:33 PM    Andrew Juge    I remember like 7 years ago I had a fraternity brother pick Adam Vinatieri in the 2nd round
8/22/10 7:33 PM    shawn kinney    with as much as you would pay for this it should go by bpa at an available position
8/22/10 7:34 PM    Andrew Juge    Hartley 53rd... WOW

(Henne Time, Henne Place proceeds to select 6 backup QB's)

8/22/10 8:12 PM    Devin Grabarek    Take a look at Henne Time Henne Place and feel better about yourself
8/22/10 8:31 PM    shawn kinney    lmao
8/22/10 8:31 PM    Andrew Juge    wow, stacked at qb
8/22/10 8:33 PM    David Kelly (Satch)    guess I didn't need to watch the saucy talk here, did I? Team Henne is f****d!
8/22/10 8:39 PM    jeremy sherwin    Are you going to post our rosters on CSC Dave?
8/22/10 8:39 PM    Mike Strasavich    hope not
8/22/10 8:39 PM    shawn kinney    you should and take a poll of who ppl think will win
8/22/10 8:39 PM    David Kelly (Satch)    Jay Preece is gonna feel like s**t if he does
8/22/10 8:39 PM    jeremy sherwin    LOL
8/22/10 8:39 PM    shawn kinney    really?
8/22/10 8:40 PM    jeremy sherwin    another QB
8/22/10 8:40 PM    shawn kinney    another QB?
8/22/10 8:40 PM    shawn kinney    lol
8/22/10 8:40 PM    jeremy sherwin    lol
8/22/10 8:40 PM    David Kelly (Satch)    Oh no! ANother QB!!!!!
8/22/10 8:40 PM    David Kelly (Satch)    poor guy
8/22/10 8:40 PM    David Kelly (Satch)    the dude's bench is all QB!

Thanks to an draft ordering mistake or two, I ended up with a terrible roster. Six quarterbacks graced my bench, and a season of add/drops loomed. Sure enough, 39 players graced my roster over the course of the season, including gems such as Chester Taylor, Kareem Huggins, Correll Buckhalter and Danario Alexander. Yet, almost exclusively because of Aaron Rodgers and the Packers defense, I stayed competitive, and the add/drops started to pay off. Here I was, in the championship game.

Going in to the game, Andrew and I made some interesting roster changes. He picked up Jimmy Graham and Mike Thomas, and I added Rashad Jennings to my team.

via img.photobucket.com

Peyton Manning had another good game for Somewhere Over Dwayne Bowe, and as he also started Pierre Garcon, his start looked great. Jamaal Charles was again fantastic, Jimmy Graham was decent, as was Garrett Hartley, but his lack of RB support finally proved fatal, as Joseph Addai mustered only 4 points, and his start of Mike Thomas was a poor decision, as he added only 3.

Despite a poor game by Aaron Rodgers, my team won convincingly. My pick-up of Rashad Jennings proved crucial, as his 19 points and 14 from BenJarvus Green-Ellis pushed me into the lead. Alongside another touchdown for Brandon Lloyd, I pulled out the win 99-85 to seal the 2010/11 CSC Fantasy Championship.

- - - - - - - - - -

On to the Fantasy Awards…

BEST COACH

Apologies for brazenly exulting over my victory, but I'll get this out of the way first by award it to myself.

MOST POINTS

This was won by Jeremy Sherwin’s Knuckle Heads, with a huge 1350 points in the 14-week regular season. His scoring was led by Tom Brady, but surprisingly the second highest scorer on his roster was the Steelers DST.

FEWEST POINTS

Joseph William Stern’s The Natural Selections scored a meager 949 points in the regular season, leaving him dead last in scoring. His running back trio of Cedric Benson, Thomas Jones and Cadillac Williams failed to show up all season long.

HIGH GAME

In Week 9, David "Satch" Kelly’s Mad Mick Beyond Superdome scored an incredible 136 points to blowout The Natural Selections, who mustered only 48. This enormous score was led by Philip Rivers, Peyton Hillis and Adrian Peterson, who amongst the three of them had eight touchdowns.

LOW GAME

Technically, this award should be shared. Dave Cariello’s Boom! Wrecked It and The Natural Selections tied each scored 41 points at one point in the season. But while Mister Dave reached his low point after being let down by his whole team, Joseph William Stern managed to score 41 despite a great game by Matt Schaub, who scored 21. This was because of his roster ignorance – he started 3 inactive players, including two who were on IR.

SMALLEST MARGIN OF VICTORY

Four games in the regular season were decided by one point, with Mobile Bay Mullets on the receiving end twice:

Week 4 - Boom! Wrecked it! 99 – 98 Mobile Bay Mullets
Week 6 - Sweep the Leg 93 – 92 Mobile Bay Mullets
Week 8 - Mad Mick Beyond Superdome 91 – 90 Henne Time, Henne Place
Week 8 – The Natural Selections 50 – 49 Boom! Wrecked it!

HIGHEST SCORING GAME

Week 11 - The Bob Loblaw Law Blog 104 - 127 Mad Mick Beyond Superdome  

In a league where the average score was in the mid-80’s, anyone scoring 104 could usually expect to win their weekly matchup. Unfortunately for Monkey Poop Battle, his team was outgunned in Week 11 by divisional rival Dave ‘Satch’ Kelly, whose team scored a whopping 127, led once again by Philip Rivers, and ably backed up by a Ravens defense which picked up two touchdowns against the Panthers.
                        
MOST POINTS SCORED IN A LOSS

Week 15 - Loomis & Lauscha LLP  116 – 112 Snakes on a Wayne         

BEST TRADE

In Week 1, after Kevin Kolb had been concussed, Michael Vick entered the game and scored 23 fantasy points. Jeremy Sherwin picked him up from the waiver wire immediately, but with Tom Brady leading his team, he accepted a trade from Stujo4’s Loomis & Lauscha LLP, who sent Matthew Stafford in the other direction. Vick went on to outscore Brady, despite starting in five fewer games.

BEST PICKUP

Here we will follow the fantasy path of Peyton Hillis.

Hillis was drafted by Dave Cariello in Round 14 of the fantasy draft. This would win draft pick of the year, but before the season even began, Hillis was dropped for Chris Ivory.

The Other Peyton was then picked by Dave Kelly, who waited a few days and then changed his mind, dropping him for the Washington Redskins DST. Luckily, though, he wouldn’t rue his decision, as he managed to pick up Hillis again the very next day. Hillis was the 4th highest scoring RB in the 2010 regular season.

WORST DROP

In Mid-October, Snakes on a Wayne dropped Cowboys WR Dez Bryant, who had scored only 26 points in six games. He was snapped up by skinnykinney’s Two Dat Super Bowl and, with Jon Kitna looking his way, went on a hot streak, scoring 53 points in only four games.

BEST OVERALL DRAFT

Looking back at the draft results the official "early favourite to win" was Two Dat Super Bowl, with 25% of the CSC vote. This may just have been due to his pick of Drew Brees, though. Most of his team ended up being a huge bust, with Ronnie Brown, Ochocinco and Michael Crabtree underwhelming and Ryan Grant succumbing to injury early.

My award has to go to Mad Mick Beyond Superdome, who took Philip Rivers, Adrian Peterson, Dwayne Bowe, Roddy White and the Ravens defense. His poor choice of Reggie Bush and the lack of depth on his bench is still overwhelmed by those five great picks.

UNLUCKIEST TEAM

This award has to go to MobileSaints' Mobile Bay Mullets, who ended 6-7-1, yet could have been 9-5 and in the playoffs with only a single point swing in each of three games.

LONGEST WINNING STREAK

StuJo4’s Loomis & Lauscha LLP strung together eight consecutive wins between Week 8 and Week 16, when he was eliminated from the fantasy playoffs.

LONGEST LOSING STREAK

After a 2-0 start, Joseph William Stern’s The Natural Selections lost five games in a row, beat Dave Cariello by one point in week 8, then lost his last six in a row to end the season.

MOST INJURIES

Surprisingly, the team with the most injuries was also the team with the best regular season record. Knuckle Heads went 10-3-1 despite missing Frank Gore, Clinton Portis, the Giants' Steve Smith, Antonio Gates and backup TE Todd Heap at different points of the season.

BEST SINGLE DRAFT PICK

The Bob Loblaw Law Blog managed to draft Arian Foster in the seventh round, with the 76th overall pick. Foster was the highest scoring running back in the entire league this season, with 313 points.

To put this pick into perspective, here are some RB’s drafted before Foster:

Pick 11 – Snakes on a Wayne – Ryan Mathews, 107 points
Pick 13 – The Natural Selections – Cedric Benson, 158 points
Pick 21 – The Bob Loblaw Law Blog – Shonn Greene, 93 points
Pick 22 – Two Dat Super Bowl – Ronnie Brown, 112 points
Pick 30 – Boom! Wrecked it! – Beanie Wells, 51 points
Pick 34 – Somewhere Over Dwayne Bowe – Joseph Addai , 83 points
Pick 64 – Knuckle Heads – Clinton Portis, 37 points
Pick 71 – Mobile Bay Mullets – Laurence Maroney, 10 points
Pick 72 – Mad Mick Beyond Superdome – Reggie Bush, 40 points
 
BIGGEST SINGLE DRAFT BUST

Despite all of the horrendous running back picks listed above, there was a clear winner here. In round two, at pick 17 overall, Saint Bevo may have thought he had a steal when he took Randy Moss. But the receiver scored only 64 points all season long, and Bevo rested him for only two games.

Hey Seahawks fans,

Didn't see a similar post here yet, so on behalf of Saints fans over at Canal Street Chronicles, I just wanted to congratulate you folks on your great win today. Though we're all feeling sick and depressed at going out of the playoffs, hopefully nobody from CSC has resorted to trolling your site.


I have to admit that a lot of us, myself included, underestimated your team and just how hard they could play. The win was truly deserved. Hasselback's touchdowns and that amazing run by Marshawn Lynch will haunt us all throughout the offseason.

Good luck in the divisional round!

Another week, another competitor eliminated. CSC'er theprogrammerman took the Packers, who lost to the Lions.

Six players remain.

Here are the rules just in case you need them:

• Please only pick each team once.
• Each pick is final. 
• You are out if your pick loses or ties, if you fail to pick or if you pick a team you've picked previously. 
• If everybody is eliminated in a given week, all entrants for that week survive.
  
• Picks must be in by Sunday at 1pm EST, unless you pick in the Thursday or (Saturday) game, in which case I need your pick by kickoff in that game.
  
• If more than one person survives to the end of the regular season, I'll add together the winning margins of each of their picks to decide who wins.

Please, if you like the idea and wish to participate, rec this thread so we can keep it up top for the week, and I'll delete it when I post each new week's thread.

HERE is the week-by-week NFL schedule at ESPN.com, and HERE is a handy schedule grid.

Good luck!

My wife surprised me this week by booking flights to New Orleans for the weekend of the Browns game on October 24th. She hasn't been back to New Orleans since 2005, and this will be my first trip to the city and my first time ever at a Saints game. I wanted to post a thread asking for advice on a few things: where to sit in the stadium, where to stay, and where to eat.


On where to sit: Is the view from the lower level too shallow? Or is the view from the terrace too high? Do you like endzone, sideline or corner seating? How much have you paid for tickets in the past? Should I buy my tickets from Stubhub, Ticket Exchange, or some other website? Or do I just show up and put my faith in scalpers?

On where to stay: We've actually already chosen the Iberville Suites on Iberville/Dauphine, but if anyone has a recommendation for a fancy-as-hell but somehow inexpensive (<$200 a night) place in the Quarter, fire away. If they have soaking tubs, you might sway my wife.

On where to eat: My wife is going to be my tour guide, but she's wary of finding a transformed city after five years away. We're not even sure if her favourite places are still there or not. Is Cafe Latrobe still open? Do you guys have any good brunch recommendations? How about Yo Mama's in the Quarter, is that still there?

I understand that I could probably find all of this information by using Google and a cell phone, but this is a very helpful community and the recommendations I've read here in the past have been really detailed. So help me out, guys.

****Edit: I figured I could actually make this post useful and collate some of the advice previously posted on CSC, both for my benefit and anyone else who needs it. So here we go:

- Another general advice thread.
- Various opinions on hotels in the city.
- Lots of good restaurant recommendations in this Getting to Know You thread.
- Some advice on tailgating.
- Yet more pregame stuff here, including this gem:

coldpizza

Also, don’t start any s--- with the locals, as there’s no security in that area. Your tires and/or homies may not make it out alive.

The venerable Mike Florio of The Sporting News yesterday suggested that the New Orleans Saints should cut Reggie Bush. It is, he believes, "a move that simply needs to be made," but one that won't because "NFL teams typically hate to admit a mistake."

Florio brings out the ire of a lot of us here at CSC, and around SB Nation, for his provocative opinions. It's gotten to the point where we want to ignore him, but he so inspires hatred that we can't help but be drawn to each fanshot that bears his name, even to suggest that nobody click the evil links within. I don't really care, though. I don't want to ignore him, I just want to prove him wrong. It's the offseason and we need something to talk about at CSC.

So let's start with his first statement on Reggie:

Continue reading this post »

So one of Stu's tongue-in-cheek comments got me thinking about whether there exist any interesting books on American football. I've spent most of my life as predominantly a soccer fan and I've read a ton of great books on that particular sport, but now my attention is mostly on the NFL (at least, it will be when the World Cup ends) I realise I haven't read a thing about it, outside of SBN and various news outlets.The Times-Picayune review of the Super Bowl winning season doesn't really count.

I've seen a couple of books reviewed on CSC, so I know our membership isn't entirely illiterate. I'd love to hear any recommendations from you guys, whether biography, history of the game or whatever.

Now that the draft is over, the New Orleans Saints will scramble with the rest of the league to sign undrafted players. According to Sean Payton the Saints expect to sign "somewhere in the low teens, maybe twelve, thirteen, fourteen in that range."

Here is a list of confirmed or highly rumored undrafted free agents the Saints have reportedly signed. We'll keep updating as needed so check back

• Jason Beauchamp - LB - UNLV (Source)
• Brandon Carter - OG - Texas Tech (Source)
• Junior Galette - LB - Stillman (Source)
• Clint Gresham - Long Snapper - TCU (Source)
• Harry Coleman - S - LSU (Source)
• Ekom Udofia - NT - Stanford (Source)
• Marcell Young - CB - Jackson St. (Source)
• Jay Ross - NT - ECU (Source)
• Rafael Priest - CB - TCU (Source)
• A.J. McKenna - QB - Albany St. (Source)
  
• Ryan Hamilton - S - Vanderbilt - (Source)
• Chris Ivory - RB - Washington St. - (Source)
• Christian Ducre - RB - Mississippi St. - (Source)
• Chris Bell - WR - Norfolk St. - (Source)
• Jamarko Simmons - WR - WMU - Tryout (Source)
• Chris Mitchell - WR - LSU - Tryout (Source)
• Carlos Brown - RB - Michigan - Tryout (Source)
• Andy Tanner - WR - MSU - Tryout (Source)
• Roderick Rollins - CB - Boston College -Tryout (Source)
  
• Razzie Smith - CB - Boston College - Tryout (Source)
  
• Sirjo Welch - DB - Kentucky State - Tryout (Source)
• Daryl Jones - WR - New Mexico - Tryout (Source)
• Rob Okeafor - OL - FAM - Tryout (Source)
• Eric Perri - K - Jackson State (Source)
  

Gil Brandt has a handy list of UDFA's here. Probably the best way to track signed free agents is right here at KFFL.

Who else do you want to see the Saints grab? What positions should be targeted?

So the Saints took Pat Da Roc and not that Washington kid, and the fallout from that continues. But who do you want them to pick in rounds two and three tomorrow?

DT and OLB are the picks for me, if that doesn't seem too obvious. Torrell Troupe or Jason Worilds in the second, maybe Al Wood or Navarro Bowman in the third.

We've got til 6pm to argue over this, so have at it. Who's gonna drop, who could we trade for, what nonsense will PayLoo actually decide on?

It was suggested somewhere that a table of the CSC mock draft be put together, and since this website takes up most of my time every day, I decided to do it myself.

Continue reading this post »

So the biggest game in the history of everything is now a week away and I feel like the focus on CSC should shift entirely towards the Superbowl. Everyone on here knows that we beat the Vikings fairly. The legality of the NFL's claims to "Who Dat" can be argued over long into the spring and summer when there's nothing else to do. The Pro Bowl can just be ignored, since the Saints don't have any players featuring and even half of the CSC board members turned down an invitation to be on a roster.

The Superbowl it is, then. I'm sure everyone here is anxious for next Sunday to get here, but since we all have to wait, I've wanted to highlight the performance of both teams and see if any analysis can be made from the library of stats available to NFL fans these days. The performances on Sunday might not correlate at all to their relative performances so far this season, but stats can be a good indicator of what to expect.

Continue reading this post »